The Jennifer Blogs

Since I've had so many emails and comments about it, I figured I'd blog about my Kindle. I've had it just for a couple of days, but I'm already madly in love with my Kindle. Granted, there are a couple of features I cannot use since I'm living overseas, but it's still worth it to me! Yes, it's expensive. Of course, just days after we dropped $399 on this little bugger, Amazon decided to lower the price by $40 bucks. Oh well. It was bound to happen, I guess. And quite honestly, this beautiful little piece of technology will be paid for very quickly.



Books in Singapore are expensive. And not just a little bit expensive. One of the books I bought here when we came to scout out places to live cost me $39 Singaporean dollars. That's $28.50 American dollars. For a paperback. That's not the average cost, but it's not uncommon. Most of the books I'm interested in reading are between $19 and $29 Singaporean dollars, or $14 to $21 American dollars. I'm reading more here than I ever have, and I just can't see paying those kinds of prices for books. Yes, there are used book stores here, but they're not easy to find and they're still expensive. Well, they're probably about on par with what new books cost in the US. Only for used books. No thanks.



For anyone who follows me on Good Reads, you know I've been reading up a storm. Can you imagine what it would cost me to buy all those books new over here? At $18 American dollars each (the average of what most of the books I'm interested in reading cost), that's only 22 books til the Kindle is paid off. I can read 22 books in about four months. Maybe five months. But the Kindle does so much more! It has a built-in dictionary. So if I come across a word I'm not familiar with (which happened a lot in a book I recently read), I can easily look it up. Kindle has free access to WikiPedia. This is one of those features I can't use. Amazon's free Internet service (WhisperNet) isn't available outside the US. But when I get home, I'll be able to use it.



Kindle also offers free email. I'm not sure what my email address is (something that ends in @kindle.com I think). Again, this is something I can't use overseas anyway. You can send documents to your Kindle - like .pdfs, .docs, or other files that you need to take with you. Only this way you don't have to carry papers.



It's also got built-in speakers or a headphone jack if you want to listen to music while you're Kindling. You can upload mp3 files to it easily by attaching it with a USB cord to your computer.



Oh yeah, and you can listen to books on tape if you want. You can buy them from Amazon or Audible. It will play either format.



The Kindle is so small and so lightweight too. Marso and the kids were amazed when they saw how compact it is. It really is thinner than the paperback I am currently reading, and it's much lighter. The screen is so easy to read - even outside by the pool. No glare!



Yes, definitely add it to your Amazon Wish List and pray your hubby is as generous as mine is! :-)